Electricall conductive glue or paint

[GreenDiesel001]

I wonder if what I am trying to achieve is possible?

 

Most of my points are live frog, however I do have a couple of crossings which have plastic frogs.

 

The plastic frogs on these are about 13mm long which is unpowered and a source of unreliable running.

 

Has any one tried applying a thin coat of electrically conductive paint from the powered rails across this plastic frog and to leave only a very narrow gap, say about a millimetre?

 

Also does anyone have experience of electrically conductive glues please; do they work?

 

Thanks,

 

Jeff

[Kenton]

Personally, I'd just save yourself the trouble and just rip them out and replace them with live frogs.

[RFS]

Personally, I'd just save yourself the trouble and just rip them out and replace them with live frogs.

I'd agree with that. Also if you make the gap smaller you could end up causing momentary short circuits as the wheels touch both rails as they pass over the frog.

[beast66606]

I also agree, you will probably spend longer trying to get the "painted" frog to be both reliable and an improvement, without causing problems.

[Crosland]

I also agree, you will probably spend longer trying to get the "painted" frog

 

http://www.euroherp.com/species/Discoglossus_galganoi/

 

I wonder if you can get them in N.

 

Andrew Crosland

[beast66606]

I know a joke about frogs, it's not even W&S material though

 

On a serious note, replace the point, but remember to insulate the joints on the crossing rails (the frog)

[GreenDiesel001]

Many thanks for your postings.

 

Unfortunately, so far as I know Peco do not make a code 100 crossing.

 

Any further comments please?

 

Cheers,

 

Jeff

[Kenton]

Build one ?

It still might be better than messing around with paint.

 

Or perhaps it is time for some serious civil engineering ?

[Guest jim s-w]

Hi Jeff

 

Aside from the paint wearing out you need to consider that the frog has that much plastic for a reason. Theres no point leaving a 1mm gap when the tread of the wheel is wider than that. It might power up fine but as soon as the first vehicle touches it it will short.

 

Try pushing a wagon through the vee and watch where the type stops touching the other 'rail' You will soon see why the frog is manufacured the way it is.

 

Hope that saves you wasting conductive paint (its damn expensive!)

 

Jim

[GreenDiesel001]

Hello Jim, thanks very much for your informative reply.

 

I am trying to get my head round how best to wire up 2 double junctions which comprise live frog points and dead frog crossings.

 

Since I need to power up only one of the crossings lines at anyone time can I simply isolate the other line? Or am I completely wrong in how I think crossings and points are wired up?

 

Sorry if I sound completely dim.

 

Regards,

 

Jeff

[Guest jim s-w]

Hi Jeff

 

I hope this helps you out

 

 

The top one shows a crossing with plastic frogs. The middle standard arrangement for live frogs, the area in green being fed via some kind of switch (usually part of the point motor) The green area needs to be isolated from the rest of the track.

 

The bottom one a combination of both. You can see how the live frog only needs to be switched while the other one can be left as is.

 

HTH

 

Jim

[GreenDiesel001]

Hi Jim.

 

I think what you have shown is a crossover, of course I could be wrong.

 

It is a double junction I have to wire up where both lines head off in the same direction.

 

Are you able to provide a similar illustration please?

 

Thanks,

 

Jeff

[Guest jim s-w]

Hi Jeff

 

Hope this one helps you

 

In the top one all of the vees are plastic.

 

In the middle one all of the vees are metal. The green frog is controlled by the top point while the yellow frogs are all controlled by the lower point. The lower point thus controls the diamond as you cant go straight on along the top track if a conflicting route is set on the bottom track

 

The bottom diagram shows a plastic frog on the lower point but note this point still needs to control the vees in the diamond if they are metal. if they are plastic then no worries.

 

HTH

 

Jim

[beeman]

I went the opposite way, having probs with some turnouts due to my not fitting insulated joiners on restarting the hobby, and opting to go DCC. This was shorting across the frogs as some of the older turnouts had a close fit. Rather than rip up my track I ground out the offending metal and filled it with Plastic Padding, Butchery in the first degree some might say. However it worked. This varied due to the age of the locos some being the older Hornby with the coarser wheels. I also found when the track was firmly ballasted its quite Ok to slit the joiners where necessary with a Dremel lookalike. My answer to track contact is to fit tender pickups where possible also on front/rear bogies when no tender, to obtain as much 'spread' on the track as possible. This leaves the 0-6-0 tanks vulnerable to this problem due with their short wheelbases. Beeman

[Kenton]

I went the opposite way, having probs with some turnouts due to my not fitting insulated joiners on restarting the hobby, and opting to go DCC. This was shorting across the frogs as some of the older turnouts had a close fit. Rather than rip up my track I ground out the offending metal and filled it with Plastic Padding, Butchery in the first degree some might say. However it worked. This varied due to the age of the locos some being the older Hornby with the coarser wheels. I also found when the track was firmly ballasted its quite Ok to slit the joiners where necessary with a Dremel lookalike. My answer to track contact is to fit tender pickups where possible also on front/rear bogies when no tender, to obtain as much 'spread' on the track as possible. This leaves the 0-6-0 tanks vulnerable to this problem due with their short wheelbases. Beeman

A really retrograde step !

 

A far better solution would have been to correctly wire the electrofrog points (not the Peco way) but to bond the switch rails to the stock rails and then isolate the frog area having that switched on the point motor. This is the standard solution to the old RTR wheel shorting problem. Without converting the point back to a nasty insulfrog. Your 0-6-0 would then continue to work perfectly. Of course it is so much easier to do this conversion before laying a point - and is one of the reasons why I do it the moment I take a Peco point out of its box. As for insulfrog - I just cannot think of a good reason to buy one in the first place.